I have noticed when I do drawings, such as the vampira one, with a lot of black, it looks great if your looking at it straight on - but if you see it from the sides, there is tons of glare where the black actually looks grey and all of the detail is lost. Is there a trick on avoiding this that I am missing? Or is it just part of pencil/charcoal drawing that cant be avoided?

Jim, have you sprayed it with a finishing fixative? I don't work much in graphite anymore and I have never cared for charcoal, but it may help if you haven't and depending on how much light is shing on it, I think that pretty much happens to all blacks.

Jim, if you want to display your drawing and minimize that glare, put it in a frame with non glare glass. You will still have some glare but it will be even across the intire picture and is much better than standard glass. If there is no light shining on the picture, like from a window creating some glare on the glass surface, you will just see your drawing even at an angle. The coating on the glass that makes it non glare, will also act as a slight soft filter, smoothing out grainyness.
I just framed Audrey Hepburn, and have to get a photo of it, it realy does bring out the picture.

It sounds as if you've reached max point with layers on your paper and its too slick to hold anymore. It means that you've filled all the little peaks and valleys of the paper with graphite and there's no more room left for it to leave a layer. Too many layers or too hard pencil pressure can do this.

You could try as Venus said, a light spray of fixative, that may bring down the glare or, if you're framing the piece, the non glare glass as Airscapes suggested.

THe other option for the future would be to try a paper with more tooth to it such as Stonehenge or similar and carefully and lightly build your layers of graphite so you try not to reach that saturation point anymore.

Thank you all for your wonderful suggestions. I really appreciate it.

That looks great.

I have heard people talking about deciding between graphite or charcoal, depending whether or not they want a shine (or reflections) in the finished blacks. Sorry I can't remember which is which.

Thanks!!! I forgot how much I enjoyed drawing! I wish I had more time to do it!